Karen Price, 50, questioned by border officials but despite the blunder being realised quickly she had to wait two days for another flight

A mother's dream holiday to New York was ruined when she was hauled her off a flight because a passport had been reported stolen - by someone with the SAME NAME.

Karen Price, 50, was escorted her through a myriad of airport tunnels to a nearby police station to question her about the document.

But, after just half an hour, officials realised a bungling Passport Office staff member had caused the alert - marking Karen's passport down as stolen instead of her namesake's.

It also emerged it had taken officials THREE YEARS to note the mistake, in which time the mother-of-two had used the passport FIVE times.

Karen, from Abergele, North Wales, said: "It was supposed to be my 50th birthday present.

"I was just a bit shocked really, I went through check in and everything else no problems.

"It was only when we went to board the plane it was then they took me aside and told us there was a problem. It was just a bit embarrassing.

"The stupid thing is we had used the passport five times since it had been reported as stolen, we'd even been to Tunisia where they signed it to say that we had been let in, which proved there was no problem with the passport then.

"I honestly thought it was a joke they were playing on me, I just couldn't believe it, I thought it was a wind-up."

NHS worker Karen's nightmare first began on June 1 when she tried to board a United Airlines plane from Birmingham to Newark, New Jersey, to celebrate her birthday just days before.

After the blunder, Karen and husband Aidan were booked on a flight two days later in a hope they could still enjoy part of their six-day holiday.

But many of their plans had to be cancelled, including a once-in-a-lifetime helicopter tour of New York and a trip up the iconic Empire State Building.

A spokesperson for Her Majesty's Passport Office said: "We apologise to Ms Price for the inconvenience caused.

"It is extremely rare for passports to be cancelled in error. If a mistake does occur it is fully investigated and resolved as quickly as possible."